


shaking

by TempestVoiced



Series: The Cracks That Let the Light Shine (Anders/Allison Hawke) [2]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, F/M, General Worrying-About-Significant-Other, Hurt/Comfort, Nightmare, Uhhh basically it's sad until it's not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-02
Updated: 2015-02-02
Packaged: 2018-03-10 03:48:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3275537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TempestVoiced/pseuds/TempestVoiced
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Her dreams start out normal most of the time.</p><p>Hawke has a vivid nightmare following the death of her mother. Anders is there to help her through it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	shaking

Her dreams start out normal most of the time.

Ever since leaving Lothering, all her dreams started on the small farmlands of her former home. The Fade knew her mind well, knew where she’d feel most comfortable. Walking a dirt road to see the cozy, if small, wooden house as she crossed over the hill made her feel less wary than she usually would upon entering the dream state. Smoke rising from the chimney and the few chickens poking around the yard made the tight feeling in her chest loosen.

Only, tonight, the walk over the hill seemed longer and the sky was swirling with dark grays and patches of black. The grass died once her booted foot stepped over it and she could feel in her gut that something was  _definitely_  wrong.

It seemed like hours before the peak of the hill finally met her feet. Looking out to the same old wooden house, something felt off. Chickens weren’t littering the yard and the chimney was smokeless. From the outside, the house looked empty, like it hadn’t been lived in for years. A pit began to open up in her stomach as she made her way to it.

A trail of dead grass and flowers marked her path to the front porch, the weak boards almost giving under her weight. The mage paused at the door, her hand hovering above the handle as she pressed her ear to the wood. It was faint, but she could hear humming above the sound of the gentle wind around her. The pit in her stomach got the tiniest bit smaller when she recognized her mother’s gentle notes.

She pushed the door open quietly, peaking her head around it. From her place, she could see an empty kitchen with an empty table and chairs. Three doors, leading to three different bedrooms, one of which was once shared by herself and Bethany. She tried not to think about it.

To her right, though, a woman—her mother, she realized—sat in a brown rocking chair, staring into an unlit fireplace. The humming grew a little louder as she shut the door.

“ _Mother?_ ” she called out, slowly walking over to her.

The humming stopped, but the elder woman didn’t turn around. When she spoke, her voice sounded tired and dry.

“ _I knew you would come._ ”

Her blood turned cold.

 _No,_  she thought, beginning to back away from the rocking chair, her mother slowly rising in it. She’d heard those words before and she was not prepared to hear them again.

Her mother finally faced her and all she could do was  _scream_.

The red ring around her neck was fresh, the stitching messy with crusted blood and decaying skin. Her once grey eyes were white, pupil-less. A pale, stitched-together hand reached out for her.

“ _But you didn’t come quick enough._ ”

She couldn’t stop screaming, tripping over herself as she backed away, then crawling backwards until she hit a wall. Her mother’s hands still reached for her.

“ _Think of Bethany, think of Carver, think of your father_ ,” she crooned, the limp in her step making her hobble, “ _You let them go, you let them go, you let them go—_ “

“ _Stop! Stop it!_ ”

This couldn’t be real. Maker, this  _couldn’t be real_. It wasn’t her fault, she knew that, she knew their deaths weren’t her fault, that Carver leaving  _wasn’t her fault. it wasn’t it wasn’t it wasn’t it wasn’t._

“ _You didn’t save them!”_  her mother screeched upon finally getting her trapped in a corner, grabbing onto the cuff of her robes and pulling her up with the strength of a Qunari, “ _You let them die, you let him leave! How could you?! You let_ **me** _die! You weren’t fast enough! You weren’t_ **good** _enough!_ ”

Her mother has her hands on her throat, choking and shaking and shaking and shaking until she can’t breath and—

The edges of her vision blur together, her mother’s screams dissipating into her own as she wakes up in her bed, her bed in Hightown, though that hasn’t registered to her yet.

She’s thrashing, pushing away the blankets with her feet while her fingernails rip holes into silk sheets beneath her. She doesn’t realize the form beside her until it’s calling her name and trying to grab her shoulders.

“Hawke!  _Hawke_!  _Allison!_ ” it calls, but she pushes it away, moves away from it until she’s on the floor in a mess of clothes and sheets and blankets, breathing heavy and scared out of her mind, shaking.

She lifts her head to see Anders,  _her_  Anders, looking at her from the bed, eyes wide and full of worry as he stares down on her. She has to remind herself this is real, that  _he_  is real, and not just another trick of the Fade. There is a soft ringing in her ears.

“Allison?” her lover repeats, this time softly but no less filled with concern, gently moving himself to the edge of the bed. He doesn’t want to get too near until he knows it’s okay, lest she lunge at him.

“Are you alright? Are you here?”

It’s somewhere between the words  _you_  and  _here_  that she crumbles, sobbing and shaking her head violently. She can’t get words to come out of her throat it’s so full of crying, and all she wants it to tell him not to worry over her as he tentatively puts a hand on her back, pulls her to him as they sit in the floor. She’s wracking her whole body with her wailing, shivering,  _shaking shaking shaking shaking_. She doesn’t like this feeling.

He’s rubbing her back, running a calloused hand through her short, choppy black hair,  _shh_ ing her until her howling turns to whimpering. She sniffs, and when she whispers, her voice is cracked and gravelly, her tone defeated.

“I’m sorry,” is the first thing she says.

“You have nothing to be sorry for,” he replies.

“I’m a mess,” she continues, whisper-mumbling into his shoulder, “It was awful.”

He knows that if he says “ _you’re not a mess_ ,” she’ll deflect it with something else, so he settles on, “Do you want to talk about it?”

She’s silent for a beat, then says, “No.”

He doesn’t press further, doesn’t try to persuade her to talk about it. He lets her decision be her own, his only suggestion that they should get back in bed.

When they’re under the blankets again, she’s attached to him like a suckerfish, arms and legs wrapped around him tight, her face buried in the crook of his neck.

He doesn’t mind at all.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired after completing All That Remains the other night. I may have gotten too emotional. Anyways, thank you for reading! This is my first fic for Dragon Age.
> 
> This is also posted on my tumblr @tempestvoiced/raediantocs  
> **Edit: Changed the name of my custom Hawke a month ago, so I changed it here.


End file.
